Third Year Reflections: Part 2 Changing Children

Creative works abound from fun times at the school table.

A second reason I (Becky) haven’t written as much in our second year here is because of our children’s changing ages, stages and needs.  It goes without saying that our kids are 2 years older and much different in many ways than when we first arrived.  Although many of you have a nifty prayer card with a picture of our family on it from when Micah was 3 and Rachel was maybe 4 months old, they are not frozen in time.  Now, Rachel is 3 and Micah is 5.    

  After two years of preschool homeschooling, I’m teaching Micah much more rigorously as he entered Kindergarten this year.  Rachel is proudly in preschool now as well.  It’s pretty crazy balancing their different learning levels, attention spans and need for attention.  Some days it’s super fun, whereas other days are downright miserable, but all in all, I’m delighted in homeschooling and attempt to rise to the challenge daily.   

Phonics "pizza delivery" game.

Many ask me how homeschooling goes with a preschooler and Kindergartener.  It is challenging when one wants to learn and the other just wants to play, but with the help of Pinterest (I never thought I'd say such a thing), I've found some activities that help engage and teach both kids on each level at the same time.  The pizza delivery game was a hit!  We delivered pizzas in "The Village of An", "At", and "Og"... with road names in each village ending in those letters (Can, Cat, Cog...).  It reviewed numbers, reading, directions, and even phone etiquette!

After reading a story, recreating it with Duplos is a
favorite activity!

I try, with varying success, to engage the kids in everyday chores.  One day, while helping take fresh beans out of their shells, Micah was inspired to plant all the beans with roots already coming out.  Because I had let the bag of beans sit out a few extra days, we found plenty to plant!!!
 

Planting beans with the help of a Duplo tractor scraper...
hey, why not!?!?

After a couple of weeks in yogurt tubs,
these bean plants graduated to the garden!

 Like a little boy in America may aspire to set up shop with a lemonade stand, he plans to sell loads of beans to make money to help feed the family.  (note: it's nice to be more distant from commercialism, he's trying to help our family have more money for food rather than buying a toy!).  It's times like these that I absolutely love homeschooling in Malawi!!!!  He has recently expanded his yogurt tub nursery to include watermelons, peppers and sunflowers...we'll see if they're as successful as the bean plants.  Meanwhile, the water has been out all week and watering anything is a challenge...but we have managed!


I am reminded how nice it was to have planning periods (when I taught in public school), not to mention lunch period to myself or with other teachers, but I have appreciated precious times with my children that I will treasure for a long time.  Our excessively inquisitive 5-year-old makes connections between biblical stories/truths and any other subject or storyline we happen to be investigating.  This provides natural teachable moments and immediate application of what he is learning.  It is honestly incredible to watch him process the world as he knows it while discovering new things and fitting them together.

 

Daddy rereads a few chapters of their favorite book
for the second or third time!

Third Year Reflections: Part 1 Less is New

I (Becky) haven’t written as much on the blog as in our first year here in Malawi.  Now that we’re starting into our 3^rd year here, I’m trying to process why I don’t write as much.  I really enjoy writing, so as I figure out why I haven’t been writing, I’ll write about those things!  Come, process with me…

Just as I'm about to go to bed, the water comes
back...so I fill containers for 30-60 min. instead
Still thankful for water!

First, not as much is new to us anymore, so less stands out to me to write about in everyday living. Driving manual transmission is second nature to me now and getting diesel instead of unleaded at the filling station (not gas station!)…having plenty of water on hand for outages, listening for the water in the pipes in the night hours and staying up that extra hour or so till midnight to fill every bucket and container available – it’s a chore, but I’m thankful for running water in the house at any hour and will harvest it when it comes!  

 Bathing with very little water (or just not bathing much!) becomes part of the variety in life rather than an Olympic undertaking... grabbing a torch (flashlight) when the lights go out and swiftly moving dinner over to the backup gas camp stove seems like a minor move rather than frantic feat.   That’s not to say some of these things don’t get to me sometimes, they do, but they are smaller hurdles than in our first year.   Day to day life is still often a problem solving activity.

One of the food stores we shop at regularly: Chipiku.

Although much of life is more familiar now, some new things have popped up recently.  For example, a local supermarket just opened an addition which nearly doubled the size of the store.  The vast array of available fruits, veggies, cheeses, yogurt flavors and other dairy items, plus a fresh bakery is quite exciting, not to mention the clean, stylish presentation in a low pressure shopping experience!  As I walked in with the kids for our first glimpse of this new attraction, I met an acquaintance who was almost giddy to go in.  “It’s the small things here, isn’t it?” she remarked.  It’s true, small things like these are actually kind of momentous, depending on the day and your stress coping level at the time.  Even if you don’t buy anything, knowing that you could if you wanted to can help.


So, less lifestyle altering things are new to us, but there always seem to be new relationships.  The expat community is always revolving with some doctors and teachers coming for a year or two, short term missionaries for 6-18 months and people visiting any of the above.  Although we are 5 weeks into the new semester, learning names of new students at EBCoM is still a common activity.  And just when I think nothing much new has happened lately, a new cultural nuance will strike me back into feeling like a beginner again.  It keeps me on my toes, and often my knees.

Flatbread, Hummus and Hebrew

Did you take a foreign language in school?  Do you remember having “culture days” or straight up “food days” in class?  They were always a favorite of mine – I was never that great at learning the language, but I could certainly learn a new recipe!  Well, Hebrew class is no different here at EBCoM.  We recently had our flatbread and hummus day in Jonathan’s Hebrew class.  Food day is always a hit!

Rolling out the flat bread.

Serving up hummus!

 Flatbread and hummus are traditional and staple foods in Israel and the Middle East.  When Jonathan studied Hebrew, his professor shared flatbread, hummus, and olive oil with the class, and so it just feels right for him to do the same with his students.  Chickpeas are not always readily available here, so I was very thankful to find them again in time to whip up some tasty hummus, get the flatbread rolled out, cooked and delivered!  It’s fun how much more relaxed the students are when we are sharing food, than when they are having class!

This year's Intro to Hebrew class

The kids enjoy sitting in "school" chairs and eating along
side the students on food/culture days.

The kids and I pop over to Jonathan’s Hebrew class partway through the class period (after the quiz of the day is done) to serve the food and get to know his students a little.  As usual, the class requested frequent food days!  They say they want to sample different flavors of hummus…and that we should come before the quiz.  Sounds good in theory, anyway!  But if you have any favorite hummus recipes and variations, feel free to send them our way!

A Mock WHAT?!?!

Need a good fundraising idea?  How about a mock wedding?  Really…just get some couple that’s already married and pretend to have the wedding all over again – just the reception part – where people give you money.  Totally normal, right?  Well, our friends who run a sports ministry here said that’s the first thing that came to mind for their Malawian co-workers when the topic of fund-raising came up!  And so that is just what they did!  When in Malawi, do as the Malawians!

Note the "bride and groom" up front.  There was even cake at the end!
They also "auctioned" off smaller cakes throughout the event.

Now, a Malawian wedding reception has some different aspects to it than the typical American version.  Instead of calmly slipping an envelope with a card and check for the newly-wed couple into a decorated box on your way into a fine dinner and dance, you stock up on lots (I mean LOTS) of small bills before attending.  Then, as the master of ceremonies announces, you go forward to participate with your gift(s).  It might go something like this:

1. MC calls up a group of people – gentlemen, ladies, people with 20’s, people with 50’s, people with 100’s (remember 100 kwacha is roughly a U.S. quarter), etc. 
2. Loud dance music in the background 
3. The bride and groom hold large shallow baskets at the front and the current group of people begin dancing (not filing, mind you!) to the front and begin throwing (far from discreetly) their bills into the baskets one at a time…to make it last longer (to show more support?)…generally keeping their movements with the beat of the upbeat music playing, of course.  It doesn’t matter if your money makes it into the basket or bounces out, it’s all good.  And if you happen to run out of money, just take some out of the basket and keep on throwing it!
4. Go back to your seat.
5. Repeat for a few hours. (I’m not kidding!)

This woman just took her whole wallet up and one by one, with the music,
put her bills in the basket (notice the bills on the ground - see #3 above).

We were so excited to attend this mock wedding, not only to support our friend’s ministry, but to have this cultural experience.  Another interesting note is that a similar style of giving happens in the Malawian church.  It’s called “Paper Sunday”.  It is well publicized and guests may be invited.  The Paper Sunday happens once a month to raise money to pay that church’s pastor.  Not all churches do it the same way, but it may be held in the afternoon, or sometimes during the morning service.

I just had to participate, but didn't want to be the only white person up there,
so I gave my friend some bills to put in too so we could go up together!